


Tricks Of The Trade

by StarOfTime



Category: Dreaming of Sunshine - Silver Queen
Genre: Gen, How Shikako’s Past Life Makes Her Different, Jutsu Development - Freeform, Jutsu Experimentation Side-Effects And Mishaps - Freeform, Kakashi's Protectiveness - Freeform, Mentorship - Freeform, Ninja Performing Inhuman Feats - Freeform, Ninja Superstitions - Freeform, Sealing - Freeform, Training Games - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-23
Updated: 2019-04-23
Packaged: 2020-01-25 14:40:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18576550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarOfTime/pseuds/StarOfTime
Summary: Shikako asked Kakashi for help with certain core aspects of her training. This results in Tenzo joining them for five AM training and Shikako being innovative.





	Tricks Of The Trade

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DawningStar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DawningStar/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Dreaming Of Sunshine](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/475864) by Silver Queen. 



> This was beta'd for me by the wonderful carsonaden. Thank you! 
> 
> That now said, please do not plagiarize, repost, or post my story to other websites. If you want to translate it, message me in the comments. 
> 
> Thank you for your consideration. 
> 
> -Star 🌟

**_Tricks of the Trade_ **

  _phrase of trick_ 

  1. _special ingenious techniques used in a profession or craft, especially those that are little known by outsiders._

_\- Mr. Google_




 

It had started with the Marker Training, when Tenzo had tapped me on the shoulder and I hadn’t registered his presence. Obviously, despite its strength and all the training I had done with Tonbo and the Sensory Squad to hone and refine them, my Sensing Skills definitely weren’t strong enough. So I had asked Kakashi-Sensei to include more rigorous sensing techniques in our early sessions and, somehow, it had ended up with Sensei roping Tenzo into joining our morning training.

He was an interesting opponent, strong and slippery and my senses were stretched to the max just trying to keep track of his location. I was getting better, but sometimes I’d locate him and lose him almost immediately after. Usually, I’d find him right before he attacked and then, distracted by combat, his location would escape me. I just couldn't devote enough attention to parse out Tenzo’s minuscule, expertly repressed signature from the rest of the energy of the World under such duress. It was, however, great training for combat situations and keeping my senses on high alert.

Tenzo didn’t show up every day however. On those days, apart from our normal Kenjutsu, Kakashi-Sensei had me focusing on a range of tricks. It was days like those, with concentrated attention and teaching from a ninja who’d been in the business for a _long_ time, that let me work out tricks of my own.

I’d been working on one such trick since before graduation. My water tube trick. So far I hadn't ever actually used it for the original purpose I'd started developing it for. But that was beside the point. Because Kakashi-Sensei had taken my trick and made a ‘game’ out of it.

The first time he threw a bubble of water at me at fast speeds, I’d reacted swiftly and hurled it back at him by snaring it in a net of sorts, made of my own chakra. It was something I'd been toying with for awhile as an extension of my tube trick. I wanted to be able to catch a Jutsu Bullet and throw it back, sort of like dodgeball. Kakashi-Sensei had upped the stakes.

In addition to Marker Training, Sensei had started hurling blobs of various liquids at me that I had to identify and react to accordingly, depending on the liquid and my surroundings. It was harder than it sounded and I _really_ didn’t want to know where Sensei had gotten that much urine.

There wasn’t only the foreign chakra aspect to think about either, there was also the nature of chakra in general. Or Nature to be more precise. The first time my chakra net failed, I hadn’t understood exactly what had just happened and gotten both wet and lightly scalded for my troubles. Eventually, however, it had clicked.

On a fundamental level, my chakra resonated with the element of Earth. Kakashi-Sensei’s was the same with Lightning. Sensei had played up the Lightning nature of his chakra, not even by enough to shock me, not noticeable unless you were looking for it; and it had been enough to disrupt my naturally Earth Natured Chakra.

It was like a revelation. If I wanted to successfully divert another person's Jutsu bare-handed, without running the risk of it being destabilized by an unknown factor and exploding in my face so to speak, I’d need to purify my own first. Every time.

Purifying chakra also took up concentration I wouldn’t have to spare in the middle of battle. So I walked the route of something I considered myself rather practiced at and I made a Seal to do it for me. By itself, the seal would simply purify my chakra as it was run through the seal, but why stop there. With a little addition, I could alter the seal to form alternately natured chakra if needed. It wouldn't be hugely helpful if I didn’t learn some new Jutsu, but for things like Striking Bolt and Radiating Shockwave, a conversion seal would be absolutely perfect.

It had been easier than I thought at first to create the Seal; once I had it however, the next problem was figuring out where to apply it. My hands didn't have much space, my arms were full and I didn't want to use my stomach for this. So the back it was, and when it came to Seal Work on my own body, I had to write it myself. My training and paranoia as a Ninja wouldn’t accept anything else.

But how was I going to apply it, you might ask? There was a very simple answer for that and I wasn’t going to like the aftereffects very much, but needs must, right? Before I got anywhere near started on placing the seal however, I needed to update the wards I had set up around my room. The current seals I had in place had been set up after I recovered from Itachi’s Tsukuyomi. They were designed to dampen loud sounds between certain hours, put in place so that I didn’t wake up my family when I started screaming in wake of nightmares. It was _far_ past time that I updated them. Marker Training had proven that I wasn’t completely safe in my home, but in my room, in my own domain, I could be reasonably assured that I was utterly unheard within my own space. I could _ensure_ that I wouldn’t be heard. So I did; and then I prepared the ink, planned the seal, and I sat on the cleared floor of my room and brought my hands up into a very familiar cross shaped seal, for all that I personally had only ever used it once before. It was one of Naruto’s favorites after all.

“Shadow Clone Jutsu.”

It happened just as I remembered from helping Naruto, and from the day I’d learned it, I gathered the chakra and it was pulled away and into the forming of a Shadow Clone. She appeared with little ceremony and barely a poof of smoke and then I was looking at a carbon copy of myself. The chakra drain itself wasn’t as noticeable this time; a phenomenon I put down to having increased my capacity to some degree.

It was strange. I did remember how it had felt to see myself in three dimensions the first and last time I’d used the Jutsu, but there was still something so utterly alien about seeing _me_ standing in front of myself. It was like staring at a life sized photograph. The kind where everything seems kind of _off_ , because it's the reverse of how you look in the mirror; the view everybody else sees.

There was something that was terrifying about looking at the face of Shikako Nara and seeing long, brown hair, braided with ninja wire and soft, brown, doe eyes shining with intelligence. Something to do with how, sometimes, I still expected to see a different face and different colorings in my reflection. Something to do with the disassociation of this body as mine.

“Are you just going to keep on admiring yourself, or are we going to get this show on the road?” My Shadow Clones’ words knocked me out of my self reflection. Partly because of their content, partly because of the utter attitude she put into them, hand set on cocked hip and singular eyebrow raised high, but mostly because they were spoken in English. _In English_. I hadn't heard a voice speaking in English in forever. I smiled involuntarily. That phrase had never worked quite as well in the Quasi-Japanese spoken in the Elemental Nations. Pulling my Jacket off, I replied in kind, the lost language, _my_ lost language feeling strange and accented when spoken through my relatively new and unpracticed vocal system.

“Let’s get this party started.” My Clone smiled back, the last words of the phrase falling silently from her signing hands. _Right now_.

It took the better part of an hour to apply the seal, in that time, I had to stay completely still and keep my chakra pulled in tight so I didn’t activate the seal inadvertently; frozen while the brush slid smoothly over my back, spiraling out from between my shoulder blades. The Ink was cold.

As my clone worked, she started humming. It was a nice song, but I couldn't place where exactly I’d heard it before. I could have asked, but I needed to stay still and so I stayed silent. My Clone kept writing. When she finished, she broke the silence with little ceremony.

“It’s done. Activating in… Three... Two... One… Go.” She’d reverted to our new native language. I was almost sad for a moment, but then my own chakra flooded into the new Seal, flowing from an external source. It was accompanied by a thoroughly creepy and hair raising feeling, as my Chakra Purification Seal drained into a central point, collapsing down and stilling in its final form of a six petaled, star shaped, flower blossom; big enough to span the entire width between my shoulders.

I pulled myself off the floor and released my chakra, circulating it purposefully to chase away the stiffness of not moving for over an hour. Then I lay belly down on my bed and traced eyes over my shadow clone once more. She eyed me straight back for a solid two minutes before rolling her eyes. From what I remembered of the last time I’d done this, I really wasn’t going to be a happy camper in the morning.

“Okay, enough with the self pity.” I blinked momentarily as Clone Shikako placed her hands in the Cross Seal and dispelled herself. I was more prepared for the backlash this time. As the Clone dispelled herself, I channeled excess chakra into my Gelel Stone. Unfortunately, I didn’t put enough in. Similarly to the day Naruto had taught Sasuke and I the Shadow Clone technique, my Clone dispelled and I blinked awake some minutes later. Damn. Once again my chakra coils felt unusually full, even with the amount I had stored In the Stone, if only momentarily. I groaned. 

* * *

I slept through the night and rose with alarm at four in the morning, heading outside to start my stretches. My brain ached mildly with the strain from my Shadow Clone’s dispelling and I was trying not to dwell on the memories that had come with it. I was halfway through when I heard the first morning bird start singing with the rising dawn. The lone voice was quickly joined by many others in a dawn chorus, accompanying me as I finished stretching and pulled a ration bar from Hammerspace to act as breakfast.

At a quarter to the hour, I finally made my way over to the training ground, Kakashi-Sensei and Tenzo already present. I started cycling chakra through my new seal, simply purifying for now as I looked to Sensei for instruction.

He laid out the day’s plan. In simple terms, it was going to be a two on one fight, us versus him. Bell Test. We had an hour from when the clock started ticking. Figuratively rather than literally thankfully; Sensei had wisely acquiesced to and acquired an alarm clock that didn’t go for the whole stereotypical ‘all clocks tick’ thing.

I looked at Tenzo.

Tenzo looked at me.

I smiled.

My hand flickered in standard sign which Sensei would easily understand, but misdirection was a thing. Then Sensei called start and Tenzo and I burst into action.

My shadow darted straight towards Kakashi in a feint, even as Tenzo darted in to trade blows. I was a lot faster with my shadow Jutsu than I had been as a new academy graduate, and the long shadows of the morning were only helping me. But those shadows wouldn’t last long with the way the sun was rising, rather than setting, and shadows on the ground stood out far more starkly in the rich, golden sunlight of early morning. To my disadvantage, Sensei knew my tricks and avoided every attempt I made to snare him; even as Tenzo gave me more shadows to work with, trees, growing, sprouting, reaching and grasping.

Running the chakra I’d been purifying back through the seal, I converted it into Lightning and  
Charged forwards, letting out a piercing whistle. It was a move that would usually be like a neon sign screaming I’m Over Here Come And Kill Me. In this case however, drawing attention was exactly what I was after. Attention meant distraction meant more chances to get the bells. Then I jinked left because at some point Sensei had made a Shadow Clone. I engaged in a brief hand to hand altercation with the Kakashi in front of me and launched backwards, trailing ninja wire and kunai and setting off a Lightning Style: Radiating Shockwave to give me room to breathe. The lightning leapt along and between the wires in a deadly, sparking net and the Clone leapt away and vanished, almost.

He’d gone with one of Sensei’s favorite standbys and I could sense him burrowing in towards my feet. I pulled the Sword of the Thundergod from its resting place and began pouring my remaining lightning chakra through the handle and into the appearing blade, coiling it steadily even as I layered my legs with swiftly purified energy. Then I plunged the blade into the earth and called the name of a technique I’d used only once, making better and safer use of it than I had when I’d created it.

“Lightning Style: Sword in the Stone!”

With a blast, the earth beneath my feet shattered, far more powerfully than I was expecting. Soil sprayed skywards in an earthen geyser, cracks spreading over the surface In a parody of the lightning that had pulverized it. Within the breaking loam, the Clone of Kakashi-Sensei was battered enough that it had popped. An unexpected mercy and one I felt sure I had simply gotten lucky on with an unexpected technique. The real Kakashi would not go down with one hit.

The explosion by itself had drawn the attention of Tenzo and Kakashi-Sensei, the memory function of Sensei’s Shadow Clone serving to let him know _exactly_ what had gone down.

Tenzo disengaged and leapt back towards me, Kakashi-Sensei leaping after. Wooden spikes immediately took root and grew around us in a dense briar, spreading thick and fast before Sensei could reach us and I turned to Tenzo and laid out my next vague plan with swift hand movements. Then the recently manufactured thicket went up in flames and we leapt into action once more.

* * *

When the alarm finally went off, it was with Kakashi-Sensei caught in Shadow Paralysis and Tenzo’s left hand around the bells, with Sensei’s right hand around his wrist and his left ready to release a Flash-bang technique. Every plan we’d formed between us had fallen mostly to pieces and I’d not had many chances to use my new Seal, but Tenzo and I had worked well together and Kakashi-Sensei was smiling in that particular way that said ‘I’m proud of you’. It was the kind of smile that made me feel the warm glow of pride at recognition inside. The kind that also carried a thread of ‘what has he figured out?’

“You’ve been practicing Shikako-chan.” I smiled back as I released my Jutsu.

It was only when we started cool down stretches and Tenzo’s chakra signature suddenly strengthened that I realized I hadn't lost track of him once in the entire hour we’d been fighting; that I’d been able to sense him all morning. The sense of satisfaction I was riding that comes from a good workout, grew and changed with the knowledge, until I was laughing giddily for no reason at all, drunk on endorphins and utterly happy with being alive.

I stopped eventually, sat on the ground and rather conscious of the presence of Sensei and Tenzo, who both bore a strange mixture of amusement and worry at my exhilarated laughter. As my laughter slowed and I caught my breath, Kakashi-Sensei crouched next to me and quietly inquired about how I was feeling. I’d turned to him and smiled brilliantly, my joy leading it all the way up to my eyes.

“Never better, Sensei.”

Kakashi’s eyes had searched mine, looking for something. It seemed like he found it, and his whole body simply relaxed, like a weight had dropped from him that he hadn't even realized he was carrying. I felt much the same. Then he’d smiled, and Tenzo had smiled, as they lay on the grass with me in the middle of a ruined training ground, staring up at a cloudless, summer sky and for a little while, that’s all the world was. Peace and smiling and togetherness as we relaxed in a training ground, alive and happy.


End file.
